How are they radically different, then? Are they not both a limited monopoly grant on the reproduction of specific implementations of ideas and derivative works thereof?

I guess if you're not willing to actually discuss the issue, we can just agree to disagree without actually understanding each other's arguments. Though that's a rather disappointing outcome.

How so? I obviously disagree on that point, so could you explain your reasoning in more detail? What parts of the laws are so fundamentally different that any comparison is inapplicable?

If there is an obvious difference that I'm not aware of, I could try to come up with a similar argument with copyright directly. I'm just more familiar with the patent side of IP law, so that came to me more naturally.

Thanks for that insightful comment, Dick.

I guess we should make sure to append "in the USA" to every sentence for the sake of clarity. We wouldn't want people coming to a US site to discuss news about the opinions of a US corporation on potential policies of a US government agency to get confused about it being relevant only to those in the USA.

Also, I'm really glad the English language only uses literal interpretations and never relies on context to alter the meaning of words. That could be very confusing.

Why? Both cover the specific implementations of ideas and the effort required to work around either is nontrivial. I don't see a compelling reason to dismiss the analogy out of hand.

The "hysteria" is about a perpetual monopoly on our cultural history. If every piece of art created in our lifetimes is locked down, then we don't have the freedom to create anything new. Everything we do is built upon the ideas of the prior generations that we are exposed to through our culture.

Ultimately, infinite term IP ownership is unsustainable. Our technological and cultural development will stall. Imagine if someone (ie a corporation or estate) still held the patent on the transistor or the lever. Those companies would control the markets for basically every electrical or mechanical device. Do you think we'd even be able to have this discussion? And why wouldn't the same effect occur with copyright once there's nothing left in the public domain to draw from?

Hmm... that is a tough one. Maybe you could print and sell new copies? If it's not worth enough to the copyright owner to make a work available to the public, then why not allow it to fall into the public domain after a decade? Maybe someone else will be able to find a way to bring it back to life and extract additional value rather than letting it sit there and fade into obscurity.

Actually, there isn't in the case of copyrighted works. If the rights holder stops selling and promoting something without re-licensing it for public use, then it is dead and nobody else can legally acquire a copy. This is one of the reasons there should be a requirement in copyright law that the work must be made available or the holder loses their exclusive rights to it.

I wouldn't ask them to watch something from their abuser, but that isn't what's happening here. No one is being forced to watch anything. They're not even being asked to. Worst case is if one of Cosby's victims happened across a rerun of his, they quickly change the channel. The MIT lectures are even less likely to be seen accidentally and the professor's name is clearly listed on it. Are you suggesting that the right thing to do is to eliminate every reference to a person just so that a few people who were hurt won't occasionally stumble across a reminder that their abuser exists? If so, where do you draw the line there? The MIT professor only violated sexual harassment rules and as far as I have seen isn't even charged with a crime. Is that really enough to warrant erasure of his work? What about a high school bully? Are they so tainted that they should never be allowed to participate in our culture again?

Maybe there needs to be a creative commons license that expressly forbids attribution, just for this circumstance. I suggest calling it CC-CYA

Nope, still no challenge there. Deleting all of Cosby's TV shows and movies would still be wrong as they are a part of our cultural history. If the content owners want to distance themselves from Cosby's now severely tarnished image, then they should make a public statement that they do not want any further association and then sell the rights to his work or release it to the public domain.

If the norm throughout time was to erase someone from history because they did something terrible once, we would never have been able to progress to the level where we could even have this discussion. Everything we do is built upon a foundation of knowledge provided by those that came before us and if we start pulling out the bricks which were laid by those we see as evil, the whole thing will come crashing down. We have a responsibility to keep growing and strengthening that foundation for future generations to build upon, which is far more important than a vain effort to erase the mistake of associating yourself with that evil person.

That's a valid option as well as long as you're aware of the consequences and that you're choosing it. Life is full of trade-offs. The real mistake is not understanding the choices you're making.

There's an easy solution to that problem. Don't fix it and tell her why.

Seriously, if someone isn't willing to learn and use the most basic of computer hygiene practices, they will eventually fall prey to malware and will almost certainly lose data to hardware failure at some point. And if you're the administrator of the computer when that happens, it'll be your fault for not protecting them (at least in their eyes).

You could also try explaining it as a car analogy: e.g. "You wouldn't just hop in your car and start driving without learning the rules of the road, would you?"

Wow, it's up to 200% effective!?!?!?!?!

That's the problem with monopolies (natural or otherwise). Still, there is an option to sign up for just the phone plans without wireless data and use wired or satellite ISPs for internet access.

You could also go the route of circumventing the problem (using the methods others have already suggested) with a bit of added effort/cost, but in that case there's no disincentive to help persuade Verizon to stop the program.

Don't use Verizon as your ISP?